Meteoric Resources has ‘boots on the ground’ within a week of acquiring Palm Springs gold project

Gold focused Meteoric Resources (ASX: MEI) has kicked-off exploration at its recently acquired Palm Springs gold project in Western Australia, while initial assays from its drilling campaign at the high-grade Juruena project are expected in August.

Meteoric’s geologists are already onsite at Palm Springs and are gearing up for drilling to begin in the September quarter.

“We are delighted to have been in a position to move swiftly to enter into an agreement to secure an Australian asset in the Palm Springs project and we already have boots on the ground (within a week of announcing its acquisition) thus officially kicking-off our 2020 field season in the Kimberley,” Meteoric managing director Dr Andrew Tunks said.

“Our plan is to heed the advice of numerous geologists previously working at the project by engaging structural experts to commence a detailed exploration program to gain an understanding of the structural setting and its controls on mineralisation.”

“Following this, we will compile a 3D model and get busy drill testing these high-grade targets,” Dr Tunks added.

Initial drilling will focus on building the historic resource at the project’s Butchers Creek open pit mine and will target mineralisation at depth and down plunge to the south.

Historic intercepts beneath the open pit include 68m at 2.5 grams per tonne gold, 19m at 8.8g/t gold and 50m at 3.31g/t gold.

Palm Springs opportunity

Speaking with Small Caps, Dr Tunks said he was very “bullish” on the project’s prospects.

Located 30km from Halls Creek in the Kimberley, Palm Springs previously produced 52,000 ounces of gold at Butchers Creek at 2.1g/t.

Mining ceased in the late 1990s due to a historically low gold price.

Dr Tunks noted that no modern exploration had been undertaken at the project, which includes three mining licences, four exploration and seven prospecting leases.

A review of the previous data revealed a “significant opportunity”, Dr Tunks added.

Drilling Juruena

In tandem with advancing Palm Springs, Meteoric is undertaking drilling at its flagship Juruena project in Brazil with a 4,000m program planned.

The diamond drilling campaign started at the Dona Maria prospect with one hole completed for 302m and intersecting a strong alteration at depth.

A second hole is underway with 210m completed of a planned 380m.

Drilling at Dona Maria is targeting down plunge of previous bonanza intercepts that were hit last year.

These included 20.6m at 94.9g/t gold from 96.8m and 14m at 81.7g/t gold from 142m.

“We have commenced work at the very high-grade Dona Maria [deposit] where we are looking to convert inferred resources to indicated and extend the resource down plunge,” Dr Tunks explained.

The second stage of drilling at Juruena will follow up on the Crentes prospect, which has copper potential.

Drilling late last year at Crentes uncovered 53.3m at 1.33g/t gold and 0.23%.